TOPIC: custom reports and custom pages

Im also interested in participating the custom report project (GSOC2012), but the first thing that came into my mind was not modifying the SGQA names to get better datasets... but simply extending the (already existing) statistics options from the admin panel. ( where you can see the responses, a pie chart export them to spss, r ...)

I thought about implementing pchart (open source lib) or even simpler, powerful and revolutionary: using R - the stat. progr. language IN limesurvey. (for now there's only the option to export it into r). There are several approaches how r can be accessed with exec() from within php! the module would be a page where several check-boxes and indiv. drop-down menus (with the var names) allow the user to decide what is shown in the report and what not: after clicking 'next' php makes an commands.txt sends it to r (on the server in a folder) r calculates everything and gives back exactly what the user needed....

The clue is: not messing with the SGQA, etc.. but letting the user see whats behind it ('the question...') within a drop down menu.

Why i would prefer r instead of pchart? -> r is kind of powerful, capable, specially designed for stat. analyses, and easy to understand, easy to customize..

+1 for R -- can what you're thinking of be implemented in rapache (rapache.net/)? I don't think it works under Windows, though.

I started coding up some of the report UI over the weekend, and was thinking about how to integrate R. Would love to work with you on that, since I actually don't know much about it, but the PhD's I'm working with are processing all their data in Stata, and when we make the switch to Limesurvey I'd like to be able to offer them that.

Im studying psychology and our PhD wants us to work with SPSS for the exams... BUT explained us all Analyses also in r (was not to learn for the exams but I liked it XD )

But i imagined sometimes the possibility of integrating basic analysing features into limesurvey - it would be great for small surveys. No need to buy expensive software or to do difficult vb programming with excel. Later one could add more features like Regression Analysis, Frequency Analyses or even ANOVAS: like this: select your independent and dependant vars or factors and click on next to analyse your limesurvey dataset..etc.. would be cutting edge for free survey software! (i dream of 'guided analyses' -> explanations, step by step help in selection of the appropriate math/stat. methods)

(@ university we use unipark/globalpark services. it gives us a dataset. for analyses we use r or spss)

of course there are other ways for this project, but as you said: r would be a 'bonus' the starting point for further implementation and scientific use

Its wonderful to use. like: import the dataset, csv for example, few lines to describe what to do and baaaam the same output like Spss, with plots and charts (Spss costs very much and r is free )

Ps: just saw that the R-Project is also taking part in GSOC.

I'm going to look up under which environments it runs.. there exist a few descriptions how to use it from php. different ways, different systems. Im going to post the links here...

As longer i think, try and read about using r on servers... the better solutions i find. look at the opensource project - rpad. it has everything we need, even editing, fully dev. web application builder, worksheet style.. wow.. i didnt try to run it on my server yet, havent figured out where to put r and how to run the start rpad command on a webserver through webinterface... but the examples on the page are overwhelming.. we could implement it in limesurvey easily: steps: - can it be installed with putting into a simple folder, - how to start r and rpad in a simple way. - how to point it directly to the selected database. -how to control limesurvey while analysis: further new userdata while doing diff calcul. would falsify results. there should be a break or message: currently this survey is in maintenance or we use dumps instead of live da ta -how to add predefined pieces of r code. perhaps with menues: add ..., select vars, ..automatic insertion of datasheet name.., insert and execute.. what do you think? rpad.googlecode.com